Growing Older
by utdfan22
Summary: Nah always knew she would outlive her husband but outliving her son was a far more nasty kind of sorrow. An examination of one possible consequence of manaketes crossbreeding with humans. More angst than family but the second genre does ultimately fit. I also didn't name Nah or Nowi's husbands because I thought it might make the fic a little more accessible.


**Author's Note: My first Fire Emblem Awakening fic and it focuses on Nah. I was partially inspired by the character Sophia from Fire Emblem: Binding Blade, mainly the fact that she ages noticeably faster than every other character with dragon's blood… because she's only a half-dragon. In just one century, she's hit her late teens/ early twenties physically (at least that's what she seems to be), which could have very tragic implications for manaketes having children with people of other races.**

**I just want to say the concept may have been better than the execution, so criticism welcomed.**

The curse of a manakete amongst humans was outliving those around you and being left alone.

In some part of Nah's mind, she had always known this. It was something she'd accepted, even if she would never like it.

Her father, her husband, the other children from that dark future, the children from the future they'd saved and their children after them… the dragon-girl would likely outlive them all.

And it would seem that her own son was to be added to that list as well.

Her suspicions had first been aroused when she'd told her mother that she thought she might be pregnant. Nowi had laughed at her and told her to not be in such a rush to grow up, she wasn't old enough for a manakete to be with child.

Nah had protested, annoyed that even her mother still seemed to forget that she wasn't as childish as she appeared.

Sure, she was still growing and her somewhat chubby features had her often mistaken for maybe fifteen (and her husband for a cradle robber) but she was in her late thirties for Naga's sake. When she'd persisted, her mother had explained that even the most early blooming manakete girls weren't capable of pregnancy til at least their second century.

Nah had dropped the topic at that and underwent the painful process of explaining to her husband that he would be long dead before she would even be physically capable of child birth.

She'd wanted nothing more than to kick herself for marrying him when she'd seen the heartbroken look in his eyes. He'd said that it wasn't her fault that he'd chosen to marry her but his kind response did little to alleviate her guilt, in fact the crushing feeling only intensified.

In the meantime, her morning sickness continued to worsen. Eventually, she'd gone to a healer in the town they were passing through to see if she recognised the symptoms. Healing staffs didn't tend to work on diseases, so it was pot luck whether or not the cleric/ priest recognised your condition well enough to help.

The local clergyman on this occasion had been an old woman taking residence in the church and her confidence when guiding Nah though the procedures had given her hope that the woman probably had the experience to figure out what was wrong with her. Those hopes were soon dashed when the kindly cleric had smiled ever so gently and told her that her stomach would start showing any day now.

Nah had smiled politely, thanked her for her time and resolved to see a more competent healer when in the next town she and her husband visited on their journey. Unfortunately, the next two had said much the same and by that point her stomach had ballooned slightly, lending credence to their theory.

She wasn't afraid to admit she'd all but forced her beau to halt his plans (he'd been fairly understanding of her wide eyed panic, all things considered) and turn around so that they could visit someone who might actually know what was wrong with her. Her mother's opinion was pretty clear so that just left the other manakete she'd met during the war against Valm. She could think of only one possibility herself and for once being right terrified her far more than being wrong.

If Lady Tiki had been surprised at the younger girl's appearance, she did not show it and greeted Nah as an old friend. She supposed they were, especially when one considered that they were both one of the few chances the other had to have a lifelong confidant.

The green haired woman had laughed at her when she suggested she might be pregnant… and noticeably grimaced when she started listing her symptoms. The Voice eventually resorted to asking her just how old she was and her eyes grew sad when Nah whispered the answer into her ear. A sadness that she had explained in a few simple words.

"You are growing much too fast."

And with that everything fell into place as Nah's mind began to turn over the miserable possibilities in her head. That was her natural state by the time the child was finally born, amidst all the joy and hardship that event brought.

Her husband called it a miracle, her mother thought it strange but wonderful… Nah found it to be one of the most emotionally mixed days of her life.

With his tiny little fingers reaching up to wrap around her own and his bleary, half-lidded eyes straining to stare up at her face… he seemed perfect to her exhausted and hormonally imbalanced mind. She'd pushed all of her doubts to the back of her thoughts and simply basked in the moment as best she could but the doubts continued to gnaw at her.

And that was where she found herself six years later, finally confronting the first of those dark feelings as the little quarter-manakete was chased around their home by his father, ducking under chairs and crawling under tables to avoid the man's melodramatic mock threats.

Despite his diminutive size, he was playing almost as boisterously as other human boys his age might have. He could actually just pass for his own age where she would have still resembled a toddler were she in his shoes.

Nah twisted her ring uncomfortably as the little boy was tossed up onto his father's shoulders, squealing and playfully protesting as the two laughed together with a boisterous joy more suited to a pantomime than their reality. The moment was just about perfect… and Nah burst into tears at the sight of it.

She tried to dry her eyes but the two males noticed her distress and quickly came to her side, her son inviting her to join them as her husband worriedly asked what was wrong.

Wiping the tears from her face fruitlessly, Nah tried to say that she was fine, that everything would be okay but the pleas fell on deaf ears as the two continued to fuss over the tearful mother.

Perhaps the most frequent occurrence that forced her to confront his rapid growth was his peer's nicknames for him as he entered his teen years… "baby-face" or "shorty". Strange as it sounded, he looked like someone who appeared young for their age rather than someone who was actually younger than he was, if that made sense.

They teased him about it certainly but they never offered to read him a bedtime story or play children's games with him as they had for Nah when she was that age. Still, Nah was happy to see him get along with the other kids.

By the time Nah had seen her husband depart for the next life, he had just about outstripped her, the young adult to her late teen as she entered her seventieth year and he his thirtieth.

He had a wife of his own by that point, a girl just a year or so his junior. Naturally, the younger woman had been slightly uncomfortable to realise her mother-in-law appeared younger than her but she'd smiled and brushed it off as best she could. Nah had far more difficulty with the arrangement… a son should never appear older than his mother.

Her son had reached full maturity by the time his wife's hair had all turned to grey, something Nah could have never even dreamed of when she'd first met her future husband. There was almost a joy in the realisation that while he would outlive many of his friends, he would probably only do so once or twice, maybe three times depending on how well he looked after himself.

Her son would have to deal with so much less loss than his forefathers who'd chosen to spend even a portion of their lives with humans. He would certainly never suffer pain on the level of Lady Tiki, lost so often to her eternal sleep and dreams of a king long since dead.

Nah had taken some measure of pleasure in being able to explain to the then-man as he was forced to see his own first love sealed into her own coffin. He did what he could to choke back his tears as she did her best to offer the same soothing comfort her own parents would have for her (and her mother still did) and his father had for him before his passing.

Wet eyes had been a rarity in his childhood, saved only for seeing those he cared for passing but the final realisation that outliving one's peers… meant actually being the last one standing had him going through a breakdown of sorts, one not totally incomparable to her own reaction when the first of her war allies had passed from the weariness of age.

Nah almost appreciated the irony that he was seeking comfort from her about seeing his loved ones pass when she would likely have to bury her own son. At least his misery allowed her to foist it off as sympathy rather than the natural result of the dread that been building ever since she first found that her normal clothes were becoming slightly too tight around her bloating stomach.

Needless to say, the day did eventually come where a hacking cough simply refused to abate and her precious baby boy was placed into a hole in the ground, surrounded by the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those who had fought in the wars against Plegia, Valm and Grima.

She was abandoned once again, holding her mother's hand as the ancient dragon whispered soothing words in her ear, trying to take even the smallest part of her daughter's pain away.

She'd once heard that the greatest crime against nature was a parent burying its own child. It wasn't hard to see why, even if she'd been trying to prepare for this moment for over a century.

The lid closed, his peacefully smiling face was sealed over and Nah's fingers tightened involuntarily around her mother's worryingly smaller palm as Nowi said not one word of complaint, knowing that Nah needed that comfort so badly as her son said goodbye for the final time.

**Author's Notes: It was just an idea I wanted to play around with and I think it's something people can empathise with. I just wish my own version hadn't come out so sloppily. I considered deleting this but I figure I may as well get some criticism on it before binning it completely. Hopefully, you enjoyed reading it, even if it was only a little bit.**

**Also, consider Nowi's position in all this. Seriously, just think about it for a minute.**


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